For the first time in the world, an aviation company has brought in reservation for women. In a move which has baffled even the most hardcore feminist and activist of gender equality, Air India has declared 6 seats reservation for women in every flight.

As per the reservation guidelines, the 3rd row of every flight ( 3 seats on the left and 3 seats on the right) would now be reserved for all women passengers who are travelling alone.

Air India general manager-revenue management Meenakshi Malik said, “We will be reserving the third row — six seats — in the economy class of the aircraft for female passengers travelling alone,”

It seems that this weird step of reserving seats for women in aircrafts has been done to ensure ‘safety’ and ‘security’ of women passengers. She justified this step, as she said,
“We feel, as national carriers, it is our responsibility to enhance comfort level to female passengers. There are a lot of female passengers who travel alone with us and we will be blocking a few seats for them.”

Enforced Gender Discrimination By Air India?

Aviation experts and female social media users have slammed this move by Air India, terming this as ‘enforced gender equality’ and ‘misplaced conception of female safety’.

Former Air India executive director Jitendra Bhargava said: “To my knowledge, this happens nowhere in the world. Planes are not unsafe for women passengers. In case of unruly behaviour, the airline crew are authorised to take action as per the law.”

D. Sudhakara Reddy, national president of Air Passengers Association of India said, “It is an impractical move and will lead to gender discrimination. The airline should not go ahead with the plan,”

One Reddit India user questioned this move, as he said, “How does this make sense? Women who fly are already well to do. The gender discrepancy is almost non-existent for such upper middle class people.”

Some social media questioned the logic of such reservation for those passengers, who are quite affluent and belong to well-to-do families. While some users asked for reservations based on caste, religion as well.

Twitter users, especially women, were quite surprised and shocked over this uncalled for reservation, which in a way enforces gender equality. At a time when it is clear that females doesn’t need such protectionism.

One female user actually said that such reservation is quite insulting.

Mohul keenly observes the nuances of Indian startup world; and tries to demystify the secrets behind Technology, Marketing, Mobile and Internet. He is a Writer by passion, Marketer by choice and Entrepreneur by compulsion. Follow him on Twitter here: @_mohul